Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. Since taking office in January,
Speaker 1: President Trump has set in motion a series of sweeping
Speaker 1: rollbacks on US climate policy.
Speaker 2: The President slashing funding to combat climate change.
Speaker 1: President Trump on social media is again calling for FEMA
Speaker 1: to be shut down, the latest firings hitting Noah, the
Speaker 1: nation's top weather and climate agency, hundreds let go, and
Speaker 1: on Tuesday, the few times Trump mentioned climate policy in
Speaker 1: an address to Congress, he didn't hold back.
Speaker 3: I terminated the ridiculous green news scam. I withdrew from
Speaker 3: the unfair Parish Climate Accord, which was costing US trillions
Speaker 3: of dollars that other countries were not paying.
Speaker 1: His remarks highlighted the ways his administration has dismantled efforts
Speaker 1: to combat climate change, and they were the culmination of
Speaker 1: weeks of actions that pushed climate change into the background
Speaker 1: at a time when governments around the world have lagged
Speaker 1: behind their stated environmental goals.
Speaker 2: Twenty twenty four was the first year when for the
Speaker 2: entire year, the world averaged over one point five.
Speaker 1: Degrees celsius Akshad Rothy is a senior climate reporter for
Speaker 1: Bloomberg News and host of the Zero podcast.
Speaker 2: Any Amount of warming. Any point one degree celsius of
Speaker 2: warming makes the planet worse. And what happens when Trump
Speaker 2: or other countries start to pull away from these targets
Speaker 2: is that we start to get more warming because we
Speaker 2: move away from the focus of trying to get more
Speaker 2: clean energy and rely less on fossil fuels.
Speaker 1: So just how did we get here, How have Trump's
Speaker 1: actions played out since his first day in office, and
Speaker 1: how will these last few weeks of climate policy reversals
Speaker 1: impact the US and the rest of the world.
Speaker 2: It is a job of a government to try and
Speaker 2: provide for welfare of society. That is why governments are elected.
Speaker 2: But if you are not going to be believing in
Speaker 2: the facts of climate change, which are scientifically true and
Speaker 2: have consensus around the world, then you're not going to
Speaker 2: be able to make informed decisions that will help you
Speaker 2: to protect people from the harm that's coming their way.
Speaker 1: Today, on the show, Trump and the Climate, a walk
Speaker 1: through some of his administration's key climate actions, the international fallout,
Speaker 1: and what it all means for the global fight to
Speaker 1: stop the warming of the planet. This is the big
Speaker 1: take from Bloomberg News. I'm Sarah Holder, so Akshat Trump
Speaker 1: has taken several actions to reverse US policy on climate
Speaker 1: since the start of his second term, but the one
Speaker 1: that really set the tone was him pulling out of
Speaker 1: the Paris Climate Agreement on day one. So let's start there.
Speaker 1: He's pulled out of the accord before, during his first
Speaker 1: term in twenty seventeen. But what's different this time.
Speaker 2: Well, you're right, this wasn't a surprise because he'd said
Speaker 2: he'd do it, and he's done it in the past,
Speaker 2: but there is certainly something different about this time. So
Speaker 2: on the negative side, Trump has more backers for his
Speaker 2: anti climate bush because there's been a right wing turn
Speaker 2: in politics around the world. There's also the fact that
Speaker 2: companies and countries that had set targets to meet as
Speaker 2: soon as twenty thirty are way off track from meeting
Speaker 2: those climate targets. And we've also just lived through the
Speaker 2: hottest year in twenty twenty four. We've breached for the
Speaker 2: first time one point five degrees celsius, which is one
Speaker 2: of the two most ambitious targets we have under the
Speaker 2: Paris Agreement. So there is the sense of whether we'll
Speaker 2: ever be able to keep under the Paris goals of
Speaker 2: not warming the planet by two degrees celsius, and so
Speaker 2: the urgency to act has grown, but clearly the companies
Speaker 2: and countries aren't doing all that much. That's the bad side.
Speaker 2: There's also a good side that is different this time.
Speaker 2: So when Trump quit the Paris Agreement the first time around,
Speaker 2: global clean energy investment stood at about four hundred billion
Speaker 2: dollars according to Bloomberg NEF. In twenty twenty four, they
Speaker 2: breached two trillion dollars two point one trillion dollars to
Speaker 2: be precise. And there is something fundamentally different about this moment,
Speaker 2: which is today clean energy is much much cheaper than
Speaker 2: the last time Trump pulled out of the Paris Agreement,
Speaker 2: and climate impacts are much much more severe, and so
Speaker 2: people have a recognition that this problem is only going
Speaker 2: to get worse. But fortunately the solutions are also getting cheaper.
Speaker 2: The other thing is that there were always these rumors
Speaker 2: that once the US, the world's largest historical emitter of
Speaker 2: greenhouse gases, the world's largest economy, pulls out of a
Speaker 2: global treaty, other countries will follow. That didn't happen last time,
Speaker 2: and it doesn't seem like it's going to happen this time.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you've given us the good news and the
Speaker 1: bad news. I'm wondering a little more about how other
Speaker 1: world leaders and business leaders are reacting to Trump's moves.
Speaker 1: Just how strong are other countries climate commitments, and who
Speaker 1: might step up and fill the void left by the
Speaker 1: United States.
Speaker 2: There's certainly been a muted response this time. Let's take corporations.
Speaker 2: Last time around, these big tech companies were justling to
Speaker 2: be the climate leaders in the world. Elon Musk quit
Speaker 2: a Trump advisory council as a result of Trump pulling
Speaker 2: out of the Paris Agreement. Well, this time around, none
Speaker 2: of the tech bosses are saying anything about Paris. Elon
Speaker 2: Musk is in the Trump government, and from a country standpoint,
Speaker 2: there isn't the same bulwark of climate forward leaders that
Speaker 2: was there the last time we had Angela Merkel. We
Speaker 2: had Justin Trudeau who had just been elected this time. Yes,
Speaker 2: Ursulav on their land from the European Union did say
Speaker 2: that Europe is going to stay the course. But even
Speaker 2: Lula in Brazil, who is going to be hosting a
Speaker 2: cop meeting later this year, let his deputies react to
Speaker 2: a Trump exit. So there's this sense among world leaders
Speaker 2: who are facing economic issues that they are not willing
Speaker 2: to try and push back against an embolden Trump.
Speaker 1: Last time we spoke the big questions at the cop
Speaker 1: summit in Baku. We're around money. Who is going to
Speaker 1: pay for the energy transition, How much developed countries will
Speaker 1: spend to support developing countries. How does the US pulling
Speaker 1: out change those calculations.
Speaker 2: That is perhaps the most significant question. So at Baku,
Speaker 2: all countries, including the US, agreed on a goal to
Speaker 2: triple climate finance from one hundred billion dollars to three
Speaker 2: hundred billion dollars by twenty thirty five.
Speaker 1: That's money developed countries promised to put specifically toward helping
Speaker 1: developing nations respond to climate change and invest in clean energy.
Speaker 2: So they have ten years to get to that goal,
Speaker 2: but it means they have to start ramping up right
Speaker 2: away because it is a big goal to meet. And
Speaker 2: now that the US, the world's largest economy, is out
Speaker 2: with all its banks and all its heft, it's unlikely
Speaker 2: that that acceleration from one hundred to three hundred will
Speaker 2: happen at the same pace as it would have if
Speaker 2: the US were part of the agreement. Now we will
Speaker 2: certainly see a rise in climate finance because other countries
Speaker 2: will start to step in. But maybe we are already
Speaker 2: looking at the three hundred billion dollar goal being missed.
Speaker 2: Even if the US is not putting any money directly
Speaker 2: from the government side under a Trump administration towards climate finance,
Speaker 2: it does contribute to these multilateral development banks like World
Speaker 2: Bank or the IMF, which then go on to contribute
Speaker 2: to climate finance. And the US is the largest shareholder
Speaker 2: in most of these MDBs, and it could start to
Speaker 2: try and pull back money that these banks were previously
Speaker 2: giving to climate finance, So that could have a multiplier
Speaker 2: effect if Trump so wishes right.
Speaker 1: And while Trump has been cutting domestic spending on the
Speaker 1: climate too, with the help of Elon Musk's Doge Task Force,
Speaker 1: an EPA administrator Lizelden has been cutting millions in EPA
Speaker 1: grants focused on environmental justice. What do we know about
Speaker 1: how these cuts could impact climate regulation and climate research.
Speaker 2: There is just so much that is happening, and it
Speaker 2: is unclear just how wide spread this impact is going
Speaker 2: to be till we start to come to the places
Speaker 2: where we expect an APA regulation to come through. Because
Speaker 2: industries need to move on and start to build things,
Speaker 2: or a climate science report has to drop because there
Speaker 2: was a deadline to produce that report and then it
Speaker 2: doesn't come. Those are things we are looking out for
Speaker 2: which are in the future, but there are already impacts
Speaker 2: that we can see. So in trying to keep climate
Speaker 2: out of the conversation, out of research, there was a
Speaker 2: downstream impact where a climate scientist in the US who
Speaker 2: is supposed to be heading a very important working group
Speaker 2: of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which is the
Speaker 2: world's premier body for all climate science research, could not
Speaker 2: make it to her meeting in Hanko and China because
Speaker 2: the Trump administration said that NASA cannot fund anymore climate
Speaker 2: science work.
Speaker 1: What does it mean for that researcher to miss that meeting?
Speaker 1: What didn't happen?
Speaker 2: Well, the US is one of the world's largest funder
Speaker 2: of climate science research. About a fifth of all the
Speaker 2: authors of these big IPCC reports are Americans. That is
Speaker 2: twice as much as the next biggest country, which is
Speaker 2: the UK. And so when you stop bringing American scientists
Speaker 2: into the climate conversation, you lose a big chunk of
Speaker 2: climate science understanding of the world. And okay, that for
Speaker 2: now is fine, but these reports which will come in
Speaker 2: twenty thirty will start to become worse today. And so
Speaker 2: this sort of pull one string and and the fabric
Speaker 2: starts to fall apart is something we expect to see
Speaker 2: more and more.
Speaker 1: Of after the break. More on what climate policy reversals
Speaker 1: could mean for the green technology sector and for the
Speaker 1: world's reliance on fossil fuels. Pulling out of the Paris
Speaker 1: Climate Agreement was only the first and a flurry of
Speaker 1: climate policy changes since Trump took office.
Speaker 3: We ended all of Biden's environmental restrictions that were making
Speaker 3: our country far less safe and totally unaffordable.
Speaker 1: His administration has blocked the enforcement of environmental justice laws,
Speaker 1: stopped a global air quality monitoring program, and started to
Speaker 1: roll back rules around corporate climate disclosures. Last month, Bloomberg
Speaker 1: reported that the EPA was recommending the government throw out
Speaker 1: its conclusion that greenhouse gases endanger the public. But there's
Speaker 1: another piece of the story. But I asked Bloomberg's Oxshot
Speaker 1: Rathi to unpack more where this all leaves investments in
Speaker 1: green technology. When the Paris Agreement was first signed in
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen, there was this rapid rise in investment in
Speaker 1: climate tech companies, and there was more funding for projects
Speaker 1: that focused on the energy transition. With Trump in office,
Speaker 1: how could that picture of global investment change.
Speaker 2: It can have pretty big impacts because a lot of
Speaker 2: the funding that went into nascent climate technologies came from
Speaker 2: the US, went to US startups that were at the
Speaker 2: forefront of developing these technologies. But it does create opportunities
Speaker 2: for other countries to be able to absorb some of
Speaker 2: this talent that sits in America, that has developed this technology,
Speaker 2: that wants to build these plants that will reduce greenoase
Speaker 2: gas emissions, that will make electricity cheaper, that will make
Speaker 2: electricity more easily accessible because it'll tap into renewable resources,
Speaker 2: not just the sun and the wind, but also geothermal resources.
Speaker 2: And it creates an opportunity for countries that are climate forward,
Speaker 2: have climate forward leaders, to give home to American startups.
Speaker 2: Because it's clear, at least from this administration's steps taken
Speaker 2: so far, that they don't care about climate technologies.
Speaker 1: What are the countries that are set up best to
Speaker 1: take advantage of this opportunity?
Speaker 2: I mean, the simplest answer there is China out of
Speaker 2: the two point one trillion dollars that were invested in
Speaker 2: the energy transition. Last year, eight hundred billion dollars came
Speaker 2: from China. That is more than the US, European Union,
Speaker 2: and the UK combined. But that's not to say that
Speaker 2: China is the only country that can win. There are
Speaker 2: all these other technologies that China doesn't have a lead in,
Speaker 2: like carbon capture, like green hydrogen, like heat pumps, where
Speaker 2: local manufacturing in other parts of the world can certainly
Speaker 2: catch up. And so you might see competition on green
Speaker 2: tech outside of America that will produce losers and winners.
Speaker 3: We have more liquid gold under our feet than any
Speaker 3: nation on Earth, and by.
Speaker 1: Far akshat, strengthening America's fossil fuel industry is central to
Speaker 1: Trump's economic agenda. He emphasized that in his speech to
Speaker 1: Congress this week.
Speaker 3: It's called drill, baby drill.
Speaker 1: But what about the economics of not investing in the
Speaker 1: energy transition and not investing in these kinds of things.
Speaker 1: Could this actually hurt the US's economic competitiveness in this space?
Speaker 2: So there is perhaps something to be gained by trying
Speaker 2: to drill baby drill in the short term. If you
Speaker 2: have higher oil and gas prices. You might be able
Speaker 2: to profit from it or make oil and gas cheaper
Speaker 2: for American consumers, but that is a short term gain
Speaker 2: for a long term loss. So one thing that most
Speaker 2: experts agree on is that the future of energy is
Speaker 2: to go towards distributed energy that comes from renewable sources
Speaker 2: because they are widely available, they're easy to tap, and
Speaker 2: now they're also very cheap to tap. But certainly ten
Speaker 2: or fifteen years from now, if we look back, we'll
Speaker 2: see this period as one where the US started to
Speaker 2: lose its competitive edge in green technologies.
Speaker 1: Well, Akshad, this is of course all happening on the
Speaker 1: heels of those devastating fires in la And just a
Speaker 1: few weeks ago, Trump moved to end climate related work
Speaker 1: and eliminate the use of climate related terms in the
Speaker 1: Department of Homeland Security, which typically responds to natural disasters.
Speaker 1: If the US government is no longer interested in addressing
Speaker 1: or acknowledging climate change, what does that mean for the country,
Speaker 1: if and when more extreme weather events happen, What does
Speaker 1: it mean for the world.
Speaker 2: I think that was a feeling that many experts had,
Speaker 2: which is, you know, when we were talking about climate change,
Speaker 2: in the nineteen nineties, it was a problem that was
Speaker 2: a decade or two decades away. Well, it's here. The
Speaker 2: la fires are a really good example that just came
Speaker 2: out said they were made thirty five percent worse by
Speaker 2: human caused climate change. But the reality has also sunk
Speaker 2: in among the people who were hoping that the alarm
Speaker 2: of extreme weather will cause people to ask for more
Speaker 2: climate action. That's not happening at the scale we want.
Speaker 2: I mean the elections around the world, not just Donald Trump's,
Speaker 2: are a proof of that. So there is a pivot
Speaker 2: that we are seeing among world leaders but also climate
Speaker 2: advocates that economic growth and progress on other metrics are
Speaker 2: also something that people care deeply about that any climate
Speaker 2: action that goes against those progress metrics is not going
Speaker 2: to fly. You have to find a way to make
Speaker 2: all these metrics work together, and you have to find
Speaker 2: a way to ensure that good information gets to people
Speaker 2: for why these decisions are being made. And so the
Speaker 2: hope that extreme weather events will finally get us on
Speaker 2: the path of acting on climate is one that fewer
Speaker 2: and fewer people are relying on.
Speaker 1: This is the big take from Bloomberg News. I'm Sarah Holder,
Speaker 1: This episode was produced and sound designed by Jessica Beck.
Speaker 1: It was edited by Aaron Edwards and Emily Buzo. It
Speaker 1: was mixed by Alex Sugia and fact checked by Adrian A.
Speaker 2: Tapia.
Speaker 1: Our senior producer is Naomi Shaven. Our senior editor is
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Ponso. Our executive producer is Nicole beamsterbor Sage Bauman
Speaker 1: is Bloomberg's head of podcasts. If you like this episode,
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Speaker 1: Thanks for listening. We'll be back tomorrow